While another 11 months are left for the Supreme Court’s deadline to get over with the process, the RLA has to fix another six lakh numbers within this time frame

Starting from January to April 5 this year, the RLA has fixed 38,428 registration plates.

Despite opening up additional counters for fixing High Security Registration Plates (HSRPs), chances of meeting the deadline of April next year for completing the target of fixing plates on the nine lakh registered vehicles appears to be a tall order.

The figures collected from the Registering and Licensing Authority (RLA) office show that only 87,123 HSRPs have been fixed till April 5, though the process was started on February 28, 2013. Given the target of fixing 10,000 such plates every month, about 1.3 lakh number plates should have been fixed to date. However, the RLA has been able to fix just about 6,000 plates on average per month so far.

While another 11 months are left for the Supreme Court’s deadline to get over with the process, the RLA has to fix another six lakh numbers within this time frame. That means RLA would have to cover over 54,000 HSRPs per month to meet the deadline.

RLA incharge officer Kashish Mittal admits that the process of fixing HSRPs is moving at a slow pace. “Though the process started in the month of February, it only gained momentum in the month of November last, when Chandigarh Police was asked to take strict action against those who did not get their HSRPs fixed within the stipulated time period. Since then, the RLA centres have been managing it all well,” he said.

He added, “RLA has seen much of the crowd in the past three months only. By providing complete infrastructure, tool kits at the centres and adequate manpower, we are trying our best to meet the deadline.”

Starting from January to April 5 this year, the RLA has fixed 38,428 registration plates, with 10,558 in January, 13,022 in February, 12,241 in March and 2,607 in the first week of April. The major rush could be seen at the RLA(south) office where the maximum number of HSRPs — 31,525 — have been fixed till April 5.

Mittal claims to have proposed opening up of five to six extra locations in the city to escalate the capacity of the vendors, so that two to three series could be completed in a month. But the private vendor, ‘Real Mazon India Ltd’, contends that it is not viable to open up so many locations at one go and to set up the same infrastructure at those locations.

These days, the vendors are busy fixing the HSRPs for the CH-01-AL series. One of the vendors at Sector 17 RLA office, Ramesh, said, “The deadline for getting the HSRPs fixed is for the public and not for us. People should understand their responsibilities. Though the AL series is going on, hardly 50-60 people with this series are turning up. Instead people are coming to get their old series fixed.”

Another vendor at RLA centre in Industrial Area added, “People have stopped taking the challans seriously. The rush has suddenly decreased from April 1; around 80-90 people are turning up daily.”

According to officials, the RLA is taking up the series while going backward. After AL series, RLA will take up CH-01-AK series next month.